THE 



MONTHLY MAGAZINE. 



gems. 



VOL. III.] MARCH, 1827. [No. 15. 



MOVEMENTS IN PORTUGAL. 



THE result of our military demonstration in Portugal has been exactly 

 that which every man acquainted with the Peninsula anticipated it would be 

 provided France was sincere in her professions of pacification, and was 

 not secretly plotting to stir up a general continental war. The Insurgent 

 army has dispersed itself, or retreated across the frontier, without attempt- 

 ing to strike a blow ; and our troops probably by this time will be quietly 

 garrisoned in some of the border fortresses of the country, to keep an eye 

 for the present upon the dispositions of Spain. Thus a complete shock has 

 been given to the infallibility of that unhappy class of politicians, who 

 never anticipate any thing less than defeat and bankruptcy, when resistance 

 to any attack made upon this country is proposed; and who in the pre- 

 sent instance (as usual), would have sacrificed the national honour, and 

 the national safety, to their favourite system of '* Economy" upon some 

 paltry consideration of shillings and pence. The arguments of such persons 

 if they require any answer from reasonable people received it in the mere 

 question which was being mooted through all England while their opinions 

 were delivered. Apart from the existence of the treaty that bound us, 

 no minister in his senses, at the time when our assistance was applied for, 

 would have ventured to allow Spain, or Spanish interests, to take possession 

 of Portugal : the only doubt that existed through the whole country, as 

 soon as such an attempt appeared even probable, was, not" Should we 

 interfere to preserve Portugal?" nobody questioned that: but 4t Had 

 we not already been negligent, and had not our ministers been culpable, 

 in not having interfered, two years earlier, to prevent the occupation of 

 Spain ?" Though our immediate object in Portugal, however, is accom- 

 plished, people of common sense will not suppose that the contest which 

 carried us there is over; or that, because a crowd of insurgents have dis- 

 persed at the appearance of a force which they knew was too strong for 

 them, tranquillity is therefore necessarily to follow throughout a kingdom. 

 To go into any deep speculation as to the final result of the troubles in that 

 country which are precisely the same with those which agitate the 

 Peninsula generally would be beyond our present time and limits; but 

 perhaps some light may be thrown upon the probable duration of the 

 quarrel, if we look shortly to the causes by which it has been produced. 



The commencement of Bonaparte's operations against the Spanish Pen- 

 insula generally, found Portugal certainly the weakest, and perhaps among 

 the most degraded, of the States of Europe. Spain, 'en slaved and beggared as 

 she was by her system of government, and duped by her superstitious creed, 

 was a nation yet of more active habits, of prouder temper, and of a better 



M. M. Nsw Series. VOL. III. No. 15. 2 H 



